To help those who want to attend this but don't have transportation (it's about an hour's drive southeast), I've arranged for a campus van. IT WILL LEAVE FROM THE MAIN DOOR OF THE STUDENT CENTER AT 8 A.M. SATURDAY, AND RETURN APPROXIMATELY 5:00 P.M.

There is opportunity to earn volunteer credit as well. An electronics recycling collection is part of the Expo for the first time this year, and the organizers need help with this and other tasks. Hopefully you're all aware you can earn the Environmental Ambassador Award by completing 30 hours of qualifying service!

One last note: ADMISSION IS FREE - but bring along spending money if you've got any because they'll have some yummy food vendors and also a really super fantastic Artisan Tent, with the artists all actively working on their respective creations!

Students will be installing a green wall with the assistance of physical plant services and two professionals from New York starting Thursday Oct 26, working until Monday Oct 29 (not over the weekend) in the College of Agriculture Building in the south wing (by the Plant and Soil Science office). Please feel free to stop by to view this exciting project. If you don't know what a green wall is.. check out http://www.plantwalldesign.com/eng/home.html This is Laurent Corradi's website of his business.

I pledge to join SIU Carbondale's sustainability efforts by developing personal habits that foster social, economic, and environmental health. I choose to use the knowledge and experience I gain at SIU to improve sustainability in the communities where I live, learn, and work.

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

We want to thank the sponsors, presenters, panelists, vendors, competitors and attendees for making this the best SIU Tech Expo ever! We will soon have links to videos and more from the event. For now, you can view technology presentation summaries and slides.

Congratulations to our award winners:

Inventor of the Year: Kathleen C.M. Campbell
Innovator of the Year: Lichang Wang
University Star-Up of the Year: Thermaquatica, Inc.
Student Start-Up of the Year: Rovertown.com

The fourth annual Technology and Innovation Expo was held at the
Dunn-Richmond Economic Center in Carbondale Friday, where the Saluki
Idea Competition concluded. The top five teams or individuals with the
best ideas were announced and awarded cash prizes at the expo.

This year’s expo theme was “Sustaining our Community” and was put on
by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research. The competition
opened for entries at the start of the semester, when students submitted
invention ideas that dealt with improving community sustainability.

It was intended to encourage an entrepreneurial spirit in students as
well as lead to environmentally friendly inventions, said Amy McMorrow
Hunter, a technology transfer specialist who helped organize the
competition.

“It was so great to see the teams present and see all of their hard work come together,” she said.source | siu.launcht.com; Nicholas Burke-Daily Egyptian

Hunter said all of the teams fared well in the competition.

“Both the teams and the organizers for this expo have been so busy,
and it is relief to see the product of our efforts,” Hunter said.

The five finalists were required to recite a three-minute pitch to
judges, who then added the individuals’ points and picked the winners.

“Ecolight” won first place and received a $500 cash prize as well as a
$600 grant from the Sustainability Council. “Saluki Sustainable Store”
won second place with a $200 cash prize and $400 grant from the
Sustainability Council. The other three ideas were each rewarded $50.

The team for “Ecolight” consisted of Eric Sia from Danville, John
Leco from Anna and Gene Park from Glenview, who are all seniors studying
industrial design.

According to information from the competition, “Ecolight”’s objective
is to provide an environmentally friendly option to replace high
traffic street lamps by harnessing power through a kinetic and solar
energy combination. The idea proposes to put rumble strips near each
lamp, which would collect energy when vehicles drive over them. The
streetlamps draw energy from a battery and can be installed onto
lampposts’ bases. The “Ecolight” team proposed the idea could create
extra energy and save cities’ electricity money.

Sia said this is one of three competitions the team has won. He said
he came up with the idea for “Ecolight” when he attended the Fusion
competition in St. Louis.

“It was funny because I came up with the idea while driving past the
Arch in St. Louis, and started thinking about using solar energy to
power streetlight,” Sia said.

He said although he came up with the idea, his teammates helped him develop it.Claude
Leco, right, of Anna, Gene Park, center, of Glenview, and Eric Sia,
left of center, of Danville, all seniors studying industrial design,
pose Friday after winning the Saluki Idea Competition at the
Dunn-Richmond Economic Development Center as Joy Christensen, left, a
senior from St. Louis studying industrial design, takes their photo. The
group won $1,100 to further its project and plan to use half the funds
to pay for memberships in the Industrial Designers Society of America
for themselves as well as fellow students. “Since we only had about
three days to prepare for the competition, it’s surreal to have won,”
Sia said. Tiffany Blanchette-Daily Egyptian

“I could not have executed the idea without the help of my teammates
who helped me research materials to use in the the idea as well as how
the technology would come into play,” Sia said.

The $500 award will be split three ways between the members, he said.

Leco said the $600 award from the Sustainability Council will go
toward a membership for all SIU industrial design students to The
Industrial Designers Society of America. Park said the IDSA is a big
group that helps industrial design students network and improve in their
field.“It is great practice for our major to go to these competitions and show off what we can do,” Park said.

Leco said the industrial design field is very competitive, and competitions give students an advantage in the workforce.

“These competitions get our names out,” Park said.

Sia said coming up with and presenting the group’s ideas helps his
peers and him get exposed to the process of meeting people in his
industry.

“We really worked hard to complete our project, and we would be up until dawn making sure everything was perfect,” Leco said.

The “Ecolight” team has plans for the future as well. Sia said they
want to find a way to backup stoplights for when blackouts occur.

As for “Ecolight,” Park said the team hopes to advance its idea to make it possible.“We would like to implement our idea in a practical way by eventually investing in more research for our idea,” Park said.

Jeff Myers, senior technology transfer specialist in the Office of
the Vice Chancellor for Research, said he is excited about the
competition’s outcome, and he looks forward to future competitions. He
said the office has plans to put on a similar competition in the spring.

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

CARBONDALE, Ill. -- A team of scientists, including
several from Southern Illinois University Carbondale, may have unlocked
the mystery of why some soybeans are resistant to the devastating
soybean cyst nematode.

Scientists, led by Khalid Meksem, professor of plant, soil, and
agricultural systems at SIU Carbondale, and Melissa G. Mitchum,
associate professor of plant sciences at the University of Missouri,
have been studying the problem for years.

And they may have found an answer within the soybean itself.

This week, the prestigious international journal "Nature," publishes
research results in which the researchers identify a soybean cyst
nematode resistant gene that gives certain soybeans natural resistance.
The study further examines the underlying processes that help the plants
ward off pathogens. The team hopes that better understanding of how the
resistant genes work will lead to better pest resistance and improved
crop yield.

The scientists still have their work cut out for them, as they learn more about how the identified gene works.

The paper detailing the work and results of the research teams, "A
Soybean Cyst Nematode Resistance Gene Points to a New Mechanism of Plant
Resistance to Pathogens," appear online in "Nature" today (Oct. 15).

Meksem said "Nature" is widely considered the top scientific journal,
especially as far as its impact on the international scientific
community and the public, as well. Publication in "Nature" is a career
highlight for any scientist, often a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence,
Meksem said. This is the first time "Nature" has published a paper from
the SIU Carbondale College of Agricultural Sciences.

Other SIU Carbondale researchers include: Shiming Liu, Aziz Jamai,
and Tarik El-Mellouki, who were graduate and post-doctoral students
while they were part of the research team.The soybean cyst nematode seems like something out of a
science-fiction movie. The microscopic worm attacks the root system of a
soybean plant, leading to stunted root and shoot growth, and then in
dead roots and loss in seed yield.

The female nematode swells as she devours the root system of the
soybean plants, often bursting through the root and becoming visible to
the naked eyed. She lays 200 to 400 eggs, forming an egg sac inside of
herself. She dies then, and becomes a hard cyst. The eggs hatch, the
larvae develop inside the cyst, and then break into the root system to
begin the cycle again.

It's a lifecycle that devastates soybean crops the world over,
costing farmers in the United States alone more than $1 billion in lost
crop yield every year. Farmers and scientists have long known that some
soybeans are resistant to the cyst nematode, but exactly why remained a
mystery.

In the past, farmers used the soybean cyst nematode resistant
soybeans, and they practiced crop rotation to keep the nematodes in
check. An infected field can lose as much as 75 percent of its yield -- a
devastating loss to an individual farmer, and a serious challenge to
the multi-billion dollar soybean industry.

Now that the gene is identified, plant breeders know which gene to
emphasize in breeding resistant varieties of soybean. This discovery
comes at a time when farmers desperately need new solutions, as the
nematodes adapt and find ways through the soybeans' defenses.

"We realized we had the gene about two years ago," Meksem said,
noting that the University of Missouri team worked closely with them to
determine how the gene worked -- an ongoing part of the research.

Monday, October 15, 2012

Congratulations to all competitors and thanks to everyone who voted online! The list of the top 5 vote earners in the online voting round of the Saluki Idea Competition is available at http://siu.launcht.com. The final round takes place at the Tech Expo in Carbondale on Friday, where the top five do a 3-minute elevator pitch in front of a panel of judges to win prizes.

Saturday, October 13, 2012

October 12, 2012

By Christi Mathis

CARBONDALE, Ill. -- The 2012 Technology and Innovation Expo next week will celebrate the innovative spirit and discovery that are an intrinsic part of Southern Illinois University Carbondale, a top-tier research University.

The fourth annual expo, "Sustaining Our Community," is Friday, Oct. 19, and will highlight the ways the University fuels growth and development in the region and beyond Southern Illinois. The event is from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Dunn-Richmond Economic Development Center, 1740 Innovation Drive in Carbondale. Registration and a continental breakfast start the day.

University faculty members will present their technology innovations, giving participants an opportunity to view exciting patented and patent-pending inventions, concepts and more. Michael Marlaire, an SIU Carbondale alumnus and NASA Research Park director, will present the keynote address, and there will also be a panel discussion that focuses on "Leveraging Knowledge and Technology for Sustainable Property." John Caupert, a University alumnus and director of the National Corn-to-Ethanol Research Center, will serve as moderator for the discussion.

The Innovation Awards presentation will recognize the Inventor of the Year, Innovator of the Year, Startup of the Year and Student Startup of the Year. During the afternoon, teams led by SIU students will showcase their ingenuity, originality, creativity and entrepreneurial spirit as they compete for cash prizes in the Saluki Idea Competition.

Teams have developed a variety of ideas for new products or services in conjunction with the theme of the day. Online voting is under way for the contest and continues until 11:49 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 14. Visit http://siu.launcht.com/ to see the original Saluki ideas and cast your ballots. The top five vote recipients will highlight their work at the Tech Expo as they vie for prizes of up to $500.

Registration for the expo is $25 per person, and includes a catered luncheon featuring regional food and drink favorites and the afternoon reception. Participants will enjoy learning about the latest technological innovations and research advances at the University and networking with others in business, industry, finance, economic development, academia and other venues.

Details about the expo, registration and the event's live webcast are available at http://tie.siu.edu/. More information is also available from Amy McMorrow Hunter at amcmorro@siu.edu or by calling 618/453-4556.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

We have 13 teams currently competing for votes in the first round of the Saluki Idea Competition.

Please go to http://siu.launcht.com and VOTE NOW
for what you believe to be the most innovative, novel, commercially
viable idea for a product or service related to "Sustainability in your
Community."

Please pass this note along to students, colleagues, friends, email lists, and anyone else you think would be interested in voting.

The deadline for voting is this Sunday, October 14th, at midnight. One vote per email address.

Winners of the first round will be announced October 15. Thank you!

As a reminder, the Saluki Idea Competition is part of the 4th Annual Technology and Innovation Expo
on October 19. The final round of judging will take place at the
Expo. Please contact techtran@siu.edu or (618) 453-4556 for information on how to register for the
event.

Friday, October 5, 2012

Sent to you by Grad via Google Reader:

Some students have pitched their big ideas in hopes to win some extra cash and recognition. A new event this year titled the Saluki Idea Competition, received its last submissions Thursday and is open for voting online at siu.launcht.com today through Oct. 14. Similar competitions were held at other research universities, and the Saluki Idea [...]

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